Reflex Light Tank
"Quantity is a quality on its own." :- Lenin, circa 1918 Tactical Analysis * Drowned in steel: The Reflex Light Tank is the basis of the Protectorate's vehicle force. Cheap, fast and modular enough to deal with any surface threat with the appropriate module (given sufficient numbers of course.) * Fast and furious: With low powered weapons and even weaker armour, a lone Reflex will be lucky if it can edge out a Beagle Light Tank, but on the other hand it is fast enough to flank enemy armies and hovers just above the ground, enabling it to travel over water and ignore terrain that would hamper other vehicles. * Safety in numbers: A low price tag and instant production both promote the mass production of Reflexes. With a larger number of tanks, more will be able to get shots off before being destroyed. However, lack of AA weaponry makes them sitting ducks without AA escorts, and rapid fire and area of effect weapons are also problematic. * Aggressive deployment: The Reflex can launch any low level infantry it has in its cargo hold in a manner similar to the Bullfrog as makeshift artillery, giving it some flexibility. Background Soviet High Command, Eyes Only Transcript: Debriefing of Slannimir Slaveli, December 23, 1968 Regarding the events transpired November 18-21, 1968, at border station A113, Khabarovsk, Siberia. Interrogator: “According to what we are told by the crews of the 48th Tank Battalion, your outpost was attacked by, quote, “very strange tanks.” The surviving crews credit you with saving, both their tanks, and their lives.” Slaveli: “I, um…that is…uh…the boys in the tanks really did all the work. The men who died, uh… well… without their sacrifice, we wouldn’t have…uh, made it at all. All I did was help a little. I mean…uh… it isn’t like I…uh, fought anything.” Interrogator: “Yes, well, I’ll see to it that command knows. Please, if you could simply describe the events for me, as they happened?” Slaveli: “Uh, of course, sir. Well, on the um, eighteenth, at around, uh, four in the morning, the alarm was sounded by the watchman on duty at the time. Of course everyone was at breakfast by then; the 48th was preparing to conduct some manoeuvre exercises that morning, to test the new kinetic cannons in the field, so the tanks were being warmed up. I was looking at one of the Hammers; one of the crew had complained that the leech beam wasn’t working, and I hadn’t…” Interrogator: “Please, Slannimir, the attack?” Slaveli: “Uh, of course, sir. So the crews headed out promptly to their tanks, and I went to find out what all the ruckus was about. There was this, uh, thing, like a wedge of metal with these weird purple insignias on them, made of some kind of aluminium alloy and painted purple. It was kind of, uh, hovering, like, a couple of feet off the ground, and had a triangular turret. There was only the one. It fired these weird, hand-shaped things like mines out of its cannon. The, um, ‘hand mines’, blew up a section or two of the wall before the boys got there. It shot a few more ‘mines’, but by then, the Flak Troopers got there, and blasted apart the mines; as for the tank, a few shots from the flak cannons managed to puncture the tank, and it started to bleed some strange silvery fluid, before collapsing in on itself, like a deflated balloon. “We called off the alarm and put the garrison on alert. We didn't expect much of anything, but, not knowing the source of the weird 'tank', I was somewhat nervous. We went ahead with the planned manoeuvres, anyway. It was about ten-thirty or eleven in the evening when we got back from the field. At around one, the alarm was sounded again. This time, the Flak troopers were already on the recently repaired stretch of wall, when I got there. Five or six of the weird tanks were there, and this time a couple fired these strange, skeleton like metal things with machine pistols, along with the mines. Our conscripts handled the skeletons, but the flak troopers had their hands full killing enough of the mines to keep the wall from being breached. It was a close thing. The wall was cracking, then someone yelled at us to open the gates. The 48th was coming out to fight. They hit these things like, well, a Hammer running through a tinfoil wall! The new 140s were incredibly effective; one shot from each was usually sufficient to destroy the weird tanks and even go through multiple tanks at once, although one or two shots from the conventional 125s had a similar effect. There wasn't enough of the weird "tanks" left to identify, much less salvage. “Well, at this point, everyone was a little nervous. We had one damaged tank that had lost a tread to one of the mines, and while several of us thought the things might be Japanese, we couldn't be certain. So we spent most of that day somewhat agitated. Oddly enough, the rest of the day passed without a single incident. But that night, around midnight, the final assault came. “Hundreds of tanks were pouring out from the night, when the alarm was sounded. They fired the skeletons with machine pistols, and those weird hand mines, and for every tank killed by the 48th, there were two more. And this time, the cannons on these tanks were firing some sort of energy beam. Each shot spread out, like a shotgun blast; the effects on our tanks were weird: the blast caused a kind of twisting in the metal, without melting it, and the closer a tank was, the worse it was hit. The base was overrun in twenty minutes. At that point, the 48th had a perimeter set up with the 140mm cannons outside, holding several buildings at the south end of the base. Everyone who could hold a gun was taking cover behind the tanks, and I'd been lucky enough to jury rig a few repair drones to the communications array, to keep everything together. Even so, the commander of the 48th told us that it was only a matter of time before we were surrounded, and overwhelmed. He told us to go, sent all the surviving personnel in the tanks equipped with the 140s out the back of the base, while he and his best crews ran interference with the weaker 125s. That was the last we heard of the remainder of the 48th.” Interrogator: “So, how did you and the remaining personnel make it out?” Slaveli: “The tanks gave pursuit almost immediately, and they were fast. We had the turrets facing backwards, leech beams online, and the surviving Flak Troopers hanging on for dear life and trying to draw a bead all the while. We barely made it, even so. We managed to leech off a couple of the odd energy guns; they helped tilt the odds a little in our favour. We finally met up with the 33rd Border Patrol Twinblade Squadron, and they saved our lives. The rest you know.” Category:Units Category:Tanks